


across ocean tides and snow-covered hills

by nevermordor



Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Gen, Homecoming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 09:03:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17138909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nevermordor/pseuds/nevermordor
Summary: After two whole years, after everything that’s happened, he wants Luffy to look different. But he still has the same scrawny arms and narrow shoulders, still wears the same ratty old flip flops and hat. The only real change is the scar across his chest, to match Ace’s own.“Everyone’s been saying you beat me here by like a whole day or something,” Ace remarks. Luffy starts in surprise, his head swiveling around, eyes wide. “I say, so what. Try beating me at something that actually matters, like wrestling, see if I don’t still win.”--Ace and Luffy come home for the winter.





	across ocean tides and snow-covered hills

**Author's Note:**

> Written for OP Secret Santa 2018.
> 
> Happy holidays!

Ace spots the little sailboat the moment that he coasts into the bay. All the other boats in Foosha Village have been stowed for the winter, wrapped in their dark tarps like shrouds, save for the single boat tied up clumsily at the end of the docks. A bright red flag streams from the mast and a layer of frost covers its floor; it bobs in the frigid water, the flag waving to him as he pilots Striker toward the shore. It looks like Luffy beat him home after all, which is a shame, because it means he’s going to be totally smug about being the first one to arrive.

Makino’s waiting for him on the beach. “Long time, no see, Ace!” she calls as he cuts the gas and guides himself carefully onto land. He grabs his bag, hops off Striker, and trudges up the beach to meet her.

“You knew I was coming,” he says.

“Luffy told us.”

“Figured as much. He never could keep a secret.”

“Look at you,” she says. Her gaze sweeps him up and down; she tries and fails not to stare for too long at the shiny, rippling scar across his abdomen, but it’s okay because he knew what it meant choosing not to wear a sash or button up his shirt. Ace is bigger, older, more scarred and more tired than when she saw him last, and there are threads of silver running through Makino’s dark hair. But he still remembers how to bow just like she taught him, and she still giggles like schoolgirl as he does.

“It’s a pleasure to see you again,” he says.

He’s answered with a loud grunt, as Woop Slap hobbles his way across the beach toward them. He’s older too, grayer. He’s trying to frown, but his wrinkles are all laugh lines in the corners of his mouth and eyes. “Two pirates in my town,” he mutters. “Too many, if you ask me.”

“He beat you here,” Makino admits, nodding to the little boat.

“About time he beat me at _something_ ,” Ace says with a good-natured sigh and Makino giggles again, even harder, when he offers her his arm.  
  
  
  
  
They see him to the foot of Mount Colubo. Makino makes him promise to say goodbye before he leaves and Woop Slap mutters about how he owes Ace a drink, now that he’s a man.

The hike up the mountain is slow going. Snow crunches beneath his boots. The forest bursts with thick evergreens and the air carries the tang of pine.

Foosha Village sprawls out beneath him, frozen: not just from the icy mist and the promise of more snow, but in time. Windmills drift in sleepy circles and children play in the sprawling fields and the windows are lit up early in the dark afternoon. Nothing’s changed here, though the rest of the world has. The Grand Line roils with chaos in the wake of the Summit War and Blackbeard’s reckless path of destruction. The waters of the New World are furious and shifting but the cove that encircles Foosha Village is still and silent.

Marco’s going to be furious when he discovers Ace is missing, hastily scrawled explanation or not. Since the Amazons delivered him home, his whole crew’s been anxious. The same men that cheered him on while he fought dozens of marine warships and single-handedly burned down pirate fleets are the ones now insisting that he keep quietly to his quarters, out of sight and away from the world. His cabin’s taken on the feeling of a tomb: still and silent, like he’d already died two years ago, somewhere in the now crumbled ruins of Marineford. He’s been good and obedient and patient like he never was, for as long as he can, sitting on his hands through the battles and Marco’s relentless pursuit of Blackbeard, of what remains of the Whitebeard Pirates and their already fading glory. But then he’d awoken to the gull tapping its beak against the window of his cabin, with a letter that bore the official crest of Amazon Lily. Inside the envelope was an eternal pose and a letter requesting that he bring two pairs of ice skates. And anyway, Luffy’s always made himself impossible to ignore.  
  
  
  
  
The front door of the Dadan Family’s fort is already flung wide open as Ace climbs the last crest of the hill. Dogra hurries across the lawn toward him, slipping on patches of snow in his excitement. “You’re here!” he cries, grasping Ace’s arms. He looks Ace up and down, glances at the scar, and grips him just a little bit tighter. “Luffy said you were coming, but you’re really here!”

“I am, indeed.”

“Hi, Ace!” Magra calls. Half a dozen more bandits spill out after him, all waving furiously as well. “He beat you by a day.”

An entire day. Kid’s going to be absolutely insufferable. “He with you guys?”

“He’s at the pond, just down the hill, I think. He didn’t explain much, he just ate all of our steak and then took off.”

“Why don’t I see if I can track him down before dinner,” Ace says, gently disentangling himself from Dogra’s grasp.

“You idiots couldn’t at least send us a gull, telling us you were coming?” Dadan’s voice is gruffer than he remembers and her hair is more gray than red. She stands in the doorway of her fort, glowering, her big arms folded across her chest. “You always were a bunch of inconsiderate little brats.”

Ace takes his hat off, clutching it politely in front of him. This trick only ever really worked on Makino but it never hurts to try. “Hiya, Dadan.”

Her scowl deepens. Her arms unfold. Her hands are in fists. “Is that all you have to say for yourself?” she demands, shoving past the cluster of bandits, past Magra as he attempts to restrain her. She advances quickly on him, despite her size. “You goddamn idiot.”

He’s expecting a slap across the face or upside the head but not the arms suddenly surrounding him. Ace goes stiff, bracing himself for when she dunks him into a snowdrift, or maybe piledrives him straight into the dirt because he still remembers one time when he was eight years old and a rival gang of bandits tried to take over her fort and she picked up a full grown man twice her size and slammed his skull into the ground so hard his jaw cracked.

She doesn’t, though. She only holds him. The last time she did that, she was carrying him through the flames of Gray Terminal, his face in her shirt to protect his lungs from the ash. Her hair is fuzzy and soft against his cheek. She smells like the smoke from her favorite pipe.

“Why the hell aren’t you wearing a proper jacket?” Dadan snaps when she lets him go. She looks dismissively at his unbuttoned shirt, hardly sparing a glance for his scar.

“I mean, I’m literally made of fire. I don’t get cold anymore.”

“First Luffy, now you. I raised a bunch of freaks. Go find your good-for-nothing brother. And bring something back with you for dinner. Damn kid ate all our steak and I don’t have money to support useless layabouts.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ace says and grins. “Hey, Dadan?”

“What?”

“Missed you too.”

Her face crinkles up tight, her mouth trembling. “Get the hell out of here,” she says, aiming a kick at him that he dodges too easily.

The pond he wants is only a mile out from Dadan’s fort. It’s the pond where they used to wade through the shallows, catching minnows with their hands, where they’d watch each spring as frogs dug themselves out of the thawing mud and Luffy would try not to bawl because he had been so sure that the frogs had disappeared and died under the ice.

Ace’s first glimpse of him is a flash of red through the skeletal trees. Someone thought to dress Luffy appropriately for the weather, in a warm cloak trimmed with fur, which is good because otherwise he’d probably be freezing his skinny ass off in his cut offs and jacket. After two whole years, after everything that’s happened, he wants Luffy to look different. But he still has the same scrawny arms and narrow shoulders, still wears the same ratty old flip flops and hat. The only real change is the scar across his chest, to match Ace’s own.

“Everyone’s been saying you beat me here by like a whole day or something,” Ace remarks. Luffy starts in surprise, his head swiveling around, eyes wide. “I say, so what. Try beating me at something that actually matters, like wrestling, see if I don’t still win.”

Luffy scrambles up from the log where he’s been sitting and sprints towards him. Ace tries to fling his arms wide in an open challenge, but Luffy’s arms wrap around him instead, once, twice, three times, pinning him. Luffy’s head butts against his chest, his face pressed into Ace’s shoulder. “Hey, Luff,” Ace begins but the arms only tighten around him further, because Luffy knows his own strength except for when he doesn’t. Ace can feel him trembling. “Hey,” Ace says again, quietly.

“I ain’t crying,” Luffy says at once. “I swear.”

“Oh,” Ace says. “You’re...shivering?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Must be freezing out here.”

There’s a sniffle against Ace’s collarbone. “Uh-huh.”

“Sounds like you’re getting a cold.”

“Uh-huh.”

Ace wriggles one of his arms free and slings it around Luffy. “You just hold on to me, then, as long as you need to. ‘Til you’re not so cold anymore,” he says, pulling Luffy closer.  
  
  
  
  
“I can’t believe you still don’t know how to tie your damn shoes,” Ace remarks, and finishes lacing up the skates that he brought along for Luffy.

Luffy, for his part, looks genuinely put out. “I can tie my own shoes. I just don’t.”

_“Why?”_

“It takes too long. I don’t wanna waste time doing it.”

“What are you in such a hurry for?”

“I got stuff to see,” Luffy says simply, and then pushes himself up off the toppled log and wobbles over to the edge of the pond. He steps onto the ice and falls straight onto his ass.

“I been meaning to ask,” Ace says, as Luffy trips and immediately falls again. “Do you even know how to skate?”

“No.” Luffy’s forehead wrinkles in confusion. “What does that have to do with anything?” His arms snake out and he grabs fistfuls of the thin little bushes that rim the pond and pulls himself to his feet. There’s a moment where his knees quiver violently, and then he tips forward and face plants into the ice with a loud squeak of surprise.

Ace almost pisses himself laughing.

“Shut up!” Luffy growls, dragging himself along on his belly. “Or I’ll punch you.”

“Yeah, you’re real intimidating.” Ace finishes lacing up his own skates and pushes himself out onto the ice. He does a quick lap around the pond to get his bearings and then glides over to where Luffy’s still sprawled, pouting. Ace winds his fist into the back of Luffy’s jacket, hauling him upright; Luffy wobbles again, flails, and almost topples the both of them. “Put your arm around my shoulder,” Ace says, as he ducks to avoid getting elbowed in the face. “And then just move your feet with mine.”

“I _am_ ,” Luffy says, pouting harder. He glares down at his feet as they slip and stumble off along the ice.

“It’s all just practice.”

“You sound like Zoro.”

“How’s he doing anyway?”

A faint, longing smile crosses Luffy’s face. “He’s alright. He usually is. It’s been two whole years, so I’m gonna see ‘em all again real soon. I hope they ain’t been lonely without me. How’s that one guy?”

“Which...which guy?”

“Y’know,” Luffy says. “That guy. That pineapple guy.” Ace stares at him blankly. Luffy lets out a huff of annoyance. “The bird guy.”

“Do you mean Marco?”

“ _That’s_ the one.”

“Stressed. But he’ll be alright.”

They finish a precarious lap around the pond together, and then another, and Luffy still hasn’t improved at all. “How come _you_ know how to skate anyway?” Luffy asks, a little sullen, a little accusatory.

“Whitey Bay used to make ice rinks for us to practice on. She helped me get real good.”

“We shoulda gone skating here, then I’d be good at it too.”

“We tried,” Ace says, guiding them around a particularly difficult corner. “You almost drowned, remember?”

“Did I?”

“Yeah. We both almost froze and Dadan wouldn’t let us take a bath so we just had to sit by the fire and try not to fucking die.”

“Oh.” Luffy finally looks up from his feet, up the hill, toward Dadan’s fort. Ace does too. The windows are aglow. By now they’ll be preparing for dinner, and the house will be filled with the clattering of the old chipped bowls and the dented silverware, with clouds of thick gray smoke as Magra starts the evening fire. At this distance, Ace can see the section of the roof that’s beginning to sag and the crooked bend in the chimney. Whitebeard left each one of his sons and daughters a portion of his treasury. Ace’s share is still sitting, untouched, in a vault in the depths of the Moby Dick. A few coins would be enough to fix the roof. A few more would replace the front door and give everything a fresh new coat of paint, where the old paint’s gone cracked and worn with age.

“When I find One Piece, I’m gonna buy Dadan a big house,” Luffy says, because they share not only smiles and scars but minds, apparently.

“She’ll complain the whole time.”

Luffy nods. “Did she hug you when you got here?”

“Yup.”

Luffy shivers. “Weird.”

Ace pulls away, with a sudden burst of speed and a squawk of protest from Luffy. “Ace,” he howls, arms beginning to pinwheel. “Ace, wait!”

“It’s okay,” Ace says. He skates a little bit ahead and then turns around and takes Luffy’s hands in his. Slowly he begins to skate backwards, pulling Luffy along after him, until Luffy’s arms stretch too far and he has to move his feet or risk falling again. They make their way slowly around the pond. Luffy’s smile broadens as his feet learn the right rhythm to move and his knees stop shaking quite so hard. “See? Wherever I go, you go,” Ace says, as he leads and Luffy follows, like it always used to be.  
  
  
  
  
After Luffy successfully gets around the pond once, all by himself, he officially declares himself done with ice skating. The sky's gone blue-dark and the stars are out. They wander together through the woods, making snowmen and then trying to kick each other’s down. Luffy’s old fort is still standing, the wood wet and decaying, even though Dadan always said she couldn’t wait to tear both their forts down for the extra lumber and yard space. Their old treehouse is worn away with age. The floor’s molding and given way in places and the rusted clock they found in Gray Terminal is gone. But the little net that holds their three sake cups is still nailed to the wall. Ace thought they might be stolen by now, or that the weather would have worn them down. The porcelain has faded in places and there’s a crack running down the seam of one cup, but against all odds the three of them are still here.

Luffy takes him to the cliff that overlooks the cove, where they used to sit and wait to be seventeen, waiting for a world that was just out of their reach. When he was young, Ace only ever dreamt of leaving this island behind for open, unknown sea and blue, endless sky. In the pit of Impel Down, though, he could no longer smell the sea. In the dark, it was all too easy to forget what the sky looked like. And when he closed his eyes and dreamed, it was of tangled jungle, of winding ravines and little creeks; it was of grass beneath his bare feet and his brothers calling him home.

There’s a small cross, bound together with twine, stuck into the center of a small crater. A little flag is tied at the top, a crooked S marked through with an X. “I made it,” Luffy says, like it isn’t obvious from the terrible handwriting and the clumsy craftsmanship. “I couldn’t get it to stand up so good, so I had to punch the ground a couple times. I wanted it to be a surprise. Rayleigh told me about how Shanks got the Mustache Guy a big grave, so I made one here too. For him and for Sabo.”

The first stiff breeze is going to knock it over sideways. Ace will have to come out here later and melt the snow, and pack extra dirt around its base so that it’ll stay standing. “Thanks, Luff,” Ace says. “The old man would love it. Sabo too.”

They sit and Ace takes the bottle of sake from his bag and warms it in his hand, pouring them three cups. Luffy makes an occasional face as he sips his sake slowly and tells Ace about the Amazons, how the Pirate Empress is kind of weird but still pretty nice, about his training in preparation for his own venture into the New World. “Rayleigh says I’m getting pretty good,” Luffy adds and then throws Ace a sly grin. “The next time we fight, I might even kick your ass. I bet my bounty’s higher than yours, ‘cause of how cool I was and everything when I rescued you.”

“You? Cool? You’re delusional.”

Luffy scowls and then looks to the flag. “Sabo, you saw, right? Tell him how cool I was!”

“You’re always babying him,” Ace cuts in. “That’s why he’s still so whiny and weak.”

“I am not!”

The flag snaps sharply in the winter breeze. Luffy pours Sabo’s sake around the base of the cross. Ace looks out across the water, at the moon, huge and low in the sky. Ice floes crackle along the surface of the bay. Luffy doesn’t remember, but when he was ten and Ace was thirteen, they both almost drowned in the little pond, just down the hill. Ace skated out to where the ice was too thin and it gave way beneath him. He plummeted, alone, into the cold and the dark. He couldn’t think, could only feel the hurt all over--and then he couldn’t feel anything at all. But the ice above him shattered, the ripples of winter light in the water like scattered diamonds, as Luffy plunged in after him. His little arms thrashing, he kept trying to drag Ace back to the surface. Magra was the one who pulled them out. They sat up for half the night beside the fire, stripped down to their underwear, huddled together in the same blanket. At some point, Ace stopped shivering and sensation bled back into his stiff, tired body. Luffy kept on sniffling and sniffling until Ace finally snapped and told him he was stupid for jumping in too, for forgetting that he couldn’t swim. He remembers the way Luffy’s mouth trembled, snot crusting his nose, but that he didn’t cry. He was getting better, by then, at not crying so easily. “You’re my brother,” he said, stubborn. “If Ace goes, I go.”

“We should do this next year,” Ace hears himself say.

“Really?” Luffy looks at him, incredulous.

“Yeah. Could be fun.”

“Like a family communion!”

“I think you mean a reunion.”

“It can be you and me and Sabo. And I’m gonna bring my crew, so I guess you can bring yours too. Oh,” Luffy says, frowning, “but are they still allowed to come if they’re not family?”

“We’re all children of the sea.”

Luffy beams. “I’m gonna invite Vivi. And Usopp can bring Kaya and those weird kids. And Nami’s sister can come too.”

“It’ll be a crowd, for sure,” Ace says, laughing as he tries to imagine cramming the Whitebeard fleet and the Straw Hat allies into a single little cottage. Dadan will probably kill them both, if she doesn’t have a heart attack first.

“Do you think Grandpa will come too if we invite him?” Luffy asks hesitantly.

Garp hasn’t made contact with either of them since the Summit War. There’s been no word of him in the papers, other than he’s been on official leave the last few months. Ace isn’t sure if they’ll ever see him again. He’s not sure the old man would come, even if they invited him. But he wants to hope so.

He’s found over the years that he likes the way hope feels: a narrow sliver of flame that flickers and won’t go out.

The wind picks up, sharper, colder. Luffy snuggles his way under Ace’s arm. “You mean it?” he asks. “About coming back next year?”

“Yeah.”

“Will you come back the year after that?”

“If you want me to,” Ace says.

Luffy snuggles even closer. “And the year after that?"

Ace tucks his chin against the top of Luffy’s head, as winter settles itself around them. “And the year after that,” he promises.


End file.
